The Truman Show

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Back in the days before 'Black Mirror', this was a film that sort of toyed with the idea of an alternate reality that uses accessible (or almost accessible) technology. It further toyed with a "big brother" sort of idea, but instead of all of us being watched, one of us is being watched, and it's all part of an elaborate, long-running TV show.

The show's concept is to take a child from birth named Truman Burbank (Jim Carrey) and air his entire life on TV. His life takes place in a massive sound studio, providing artificial everything it takes to convince Truman that it's all real. However, when a stage light falls from the sky, it sets into motion a series of strange occurrences that suggest to Truman that something truly bizarre is happening in his life.

That's really all there is to it, in a nutshell, and despite a few odd CG effects (for 1998), the film still totally holds up. It gets us thinking, and the idea that such a thing could be real is sort of brought to the forefront, although it probably worked better in 1998 than 20-plus years later. Nowadays we have shows like 'Black Mirror' that we compare things like this to, as it sits at the top. But unlike 'Black Mirror', this isn't really a cautionary tale. To me, this is much more of a metaphor about the escape from our everyday, strange reality.

Despite the set-up, Truman is just an average, everyday, normal guy. He's married, he works for an insurance company, and his daily life is altogether similar to most. However, the idea of free will is often questioned here, as the show's creator and executive producer, Christof (Ed Harris), essentially plays God through all of this. As he mentions in the beginning, Truman has complete control over his actions and decisions, but things are also controlled. If he's not "meant" to do something or go somewhere, Christof gets his crew to stop him. This is best illustrated by instilling the fear of the ocean inside him in a truly traumatizing way (which also makes him stay put).

A lot of people didn't know what to make of 'The Truman Show' upon its release, as it was Jim Carrey's first real step away from his comedic antics. The year before, 'Liar Liar' was released, though, which was a solid combination of his comedic and dramatic skills, so speaking for myself, I never minded him stepping forward to try something new. Nowadays, however, the film has seemingly gained a bit of a cult following, and is seen as a better story now than it was before. Also, One thing I didn't realize (so I'll share it here) was that this was inspired by a 'Twilight Zone' episode from the late 80's called 'Special Service', so that may very well be worth checking out.

My humble opinion is that it's one of Jim Carrey's finest films. We get a fair share of comedy from him here, but he also shows us that he can take things seriously. In retrospect, it's hard to picture anyone else in the role. Despite a few nay-sayers back when it was released, it currently has extremely positive reviews and has become a classic of sorts. I'd probably say that it was ahead of its time, but now is the perfect time to watch it.

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